


Fly

by anthologia



Category: Dead Poets Society (1989)
Genre: In-Character Poetry, Meta, Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-14
Updated: 2016-01-14
Packaged: 2018-05-14 00:01:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5722018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anthologia/pseuds/anthologia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And we cry<br/>That we’d just begun to fly.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(A poem Todd Anderson could have but did not write.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fly

**Author's Note:**

> I like to imagine that, after the events of the movie, Todd Anderson becomes a well-respected and well-known poet, the type whose work ends up being looked at in other English classes while everyone debates whether he was closeted gay or not and if there was some tragic love of his life who inspired a set of his more famous poetry. (Seriously, Todd's life and the events of the movie would totally lend itself to that kind of analysis.) 
> 
> So, at one point I decided to try writing a poem in Todd Anderson's style because reasons. In addition to the sweaty-toothed madman piece in the final cut of the movie, there's also a poem of his that would have been performed after Neil's play. (It does show up a couple times in pieces; Neil starts to read it when Todd is chasing him around their room trying to get his notebook back.) He has everyone participate in the reading by speaking the "And still we sleep" line.
> 
> "We are dreaming of tomorrow and tomorrow isn't coming,  
> We are dreaming of a glory that we don't really want.  
> We are dreaming of a new day when the new day's here already.  
> We are running from the battle when it's one that must be fought.
> 
> And still we sleep.
> 
> listening for the calling but never really heeding,  
> Hoping for the future when the future's only plans.  
> Dreaming of the wisdom that we are dodging daily,  
> Praying for a savior when salvation's in our hands.
> 
> And still we sleep.
> 
> And still we dream.  
> And still we pray.  
> And still we fear.  
> And still we sleep."
> 
> I came away with a couple impressions: one is that he seems to write poetry that's performance-oriented. Another is that he favors structure with a lot of repetition and parallelism. And finally, there's a theme of being held back and scared to move forward. Which makes total sense for the movie, which is about a bunch of kids being shoehorned into the careers their parents picked for them and refused an identity of their own, and also for Todd personally, who was pretty fucked over by his parents. 
> 
> So I went for something with a heavy rhythm that would hopefully lend itself to being performed rather than read, parallelism, and the same theme of being held back by fear and by actual barriers. I guess you decide if I succeeded.

After hours and days of straining, in the broken summer heat,

After months and days of gaining, as we learned to use our feet,

After years and days of training, in the sun and fog and sleet,

              They clipped our wings so we’d know our own defeat.

 

And we cry

That we’d just begun to fly.

 

After hours and nights of screaming, when our thoughts would hide away,

After months and nights of dreaming, as we clutched our hopes ‘til day,

After years and nights of scheming, we went searching for our way,

              They clipped our wings so we’d know our own decay.

 

And we cry

That we’d just begun to fly.

 

We thought they’d let us go, if only we could lie;

We thought they’d let us go, if only we would try;

We thought they’d let us go, if only when we die –

They clipped our wings – all we wanted was the sky.

They clipped our wings as we’d just begun to fly.

**Author's Note:**

> This was kind of a departure from my usual fare, but if you are interested in my writing and want more, I have an account at syntactition.tumblr.com where I have bits of stories that are currently in the works and other ficlets and stories that haven't made their way to AO3.


End file.
